The Virus that is creating chaos from the recent times, Wanna Cry virus that attacked the systems all over the world from May 12, 2017, the attack has caused lot of damage to the Corporates and the government bodies across the countries, the virus has also attacked India, the virus attacks the computer with Microsoft software.
80% of the ATM’s in the country will operate on Windows XP that more chances to get targeted by the virus easily, the firmware limits the ATM activities only to checking the balance and dispensing cash from the account. others all are blacklisted to prevent it from the virus attack.
The ATM’s in Hyderabad has still not been a prey to the virus and the city officials are on high alert about the virus that can cause huge loss to the government and people.
The Banks and the ATM managing companies do not want to take a chance, the officials are working to update the Microsoft to protect the systems from the malware. The ATM’s across the city will be updated by the fresh patches after being tested by ATM OEM( Orginal Equipment Manufacture) over next few days.
“We are working on the advisories sent out by various agencies on data protection within the banking system, but we have not yet received any communication regarding ATMs. None of our ATMs has been impacted by ransomware attacks,” said a top official of a public sector bank.
“Though the chances of ATMs being impacted by this cyber-attack are very slim, it is not just Windows XP that can be corrupted by ransomware. Other versions of Windows Vista, Windows 2003, Windows 2008, which are used by many ATMs, too are vulnerable,” said Manohar Bhoi, president (technology), Electronic Payments and Services, a management services firm that handle ATMs for public sector banks according to Times of India.
The Banks are working under the advisory given by Indian Computer Emergency Response team and Insitute for Development and research in Banking technology which is based out of Hyderabad is a wing of RBI. The ATM will be updating the patches, for those which are running over old OS and the news one’s, irrespective of the ATM’s they patches will be upgraded to secure it from the attack.
The Web seminar was given to banks on how to protect the IT systems and was advised to not open any spam or unknown emails.
